ShmoopTube

Where Monty Python meets your 10th grade teacher.

Search Thousands of Shmoop Videos

AP English Language and Composition 5.6 Passage Drill 172 Views


Share It!


Description:

AP English Language and Composition 5.6 Passage Drill. Which of the following is the grammatical equivalent to "hitherto"?

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:00

[ musical flourish ]

00:03

And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by ethical neutrality.

00:07

There's right, there's wrong,

00:09

and there's... meh. [image of 3 ladies wearing feather wings]

00:12

All right, check out the following passage.

00:13

[ mumbles ]

00:21

Which of the following is the grammatical equivalent of "hitherto"? [Question related to passage]

00:25

And here are the potential answers.

00:29

All right, well, even if we've never heard the word "hitherto,"

00:32

we can still use context to get the right answer. [a lady writing something]

00:35

The easiest thing to do is swap each option for "hitherto"

00:39

and see if the sentence still works.

00:41

We'll begin with E.

00:42

It doesn't work to stick the word "specifically" in "hitherto"'s place.

00:46

Well, there's just no need for "specifically" here.

00:48

Why would the speaker need to clarify that he's specifically

00:51

speaking about philosophy in the first sentence? [Man talking to a lady about philosophy]

00:54

He starts out talking about philosophy, so we don't need to be

00:57

told that's what he's specifically talking about it. He's just talking about it.

01:00

All right, we're beating a dead horse here. That's a gross expression. [eyes of a horse popping]

01:03

All right, choice C makes the same mistake as E,

01:06

just more obviously. This is the first sentence, so nothing's been mentioned before.

01:10

All right, while we're at it, we'll nix B for the same reason. {Evaluating options]

01:13

We also only use the word "nevertheless" when we're referring

01:16

to an earlier point. We'd say,

01:18

"She didn't like Brad because he had bad breath. [a girl disgusted by the boy's breath]

01:21

Nevertheless, she went out with him because she felt bad for him."

01:24

But it makes no sense to start off

01:26

with just "Nevertheless, she went out with him."

01:29

And then there's choice D. We usually use the phrase

01:32

"to all appearances" when something appears [narrator evaluating options]

01:35

to be something it's not. We might say,

01:37

"To all appearances, Brad was just a stinky dork,

01:39

but then she found out he was a sick DJ." [DJ playing some music]

01:42

Well, the phrase doesn't work in the first sentence of this passage, though.

01:46

It'd make sense if the speaker's larger point were that

01:48

contrary to popular belief

01:50

philosophy has been ethically neutral.

01:52

That's the opposite of what he's saying, though, so option D is eliminated.

01:56

The correct answer is A. In philosophy, [narrator continues reading]

01:58

thus far, ethical neutrality has been seldom sought

02:02

and hardly ever achieved.

02:03

"Thus far" means "up until now"

02:06

and the speaker is talking about the fact that philosophy has

02:08

been in sore need of some ethical neutrality for quite a while. [a Doctor talking to his patient]

02:12

When we were kids and we stole cookies from the cookie jar,

02:14

our parents told us we were in the wrong, and we told them

02:16

they oughta try a little ethical neutrality. [boy stealing a cookie from a cookie jar]

02:18

[ squeaking ]

Up Next

AP English Language and Composition 1.2 Passage Drill
842 Views

AP English Language and Composition: Passage Drill Drill 1, Problem 2. What is the speaker's primary purpose in using onomatopoeia in line four?

Related Videos

AP English Literature and Composition 1.1 Passage Drill 7
310 Views

AP English Literature and Composition 1.1 Passage Drill 7. The primary purpose of this passage is what?

AP English Language and Composition 3.8 Passage Drill
225 Views

Wishing upon a star may help you pass your AP English Language and Composition test, but answering this question would be a safer bet.

AP English Language and Composition 4.6 Passage Drill
230 Views

Take a look at this shmoopy question and see if you can figure out which device the speaker employs the most.

AP English Language and Composition 4.5 Passage Drill
168 Views

Feel like shifting gears and answering a question about shifting tones? We've got you covered. Take a look at this question and see if you can foll...